Usually when we start out liking music, our music tastes evolve and change drastically. I’m not the nu-metal loving kid I was anymore but some bands have a rule that when you like them, you just can’t get out. The Offspring come to this rule for me; I’ve always been a big fan, no matter what type of music I was into at the time and one album I always went back for was Smash. One of my personal favourites I’ve never been able to turn my back on them. It may not seem it, the way I review on this site but those sentences are a hundred percent true. Smash is a great album with some very fun punk songs. The Offspring have some obvious influences, the most obvious being TSOL since the vocals and song structures are quite similar. Bad Religion also seems obvious the way the instruments sound. Smash was also the record that gave The Offspring that special boost they needed at the time. The album had spawned three moderately successful singles which consist of:
Come Out and Play,
Self-Esteem and to a lesser extent
Gotta Get Away.
The Offspring consist of four young guys by the name of Brian (Dexter) Holland, Greg K, Noodles and Ron Welty (who was replaced by some dude named Atom in 2002 or 2003, don’t remember). Dexter seems to be the main reason people don’t like the band. He is certainly an acquired taste but adds greatly to the band. Noodles is possibly my favourite part of the band, he is not a technical player but makes up for it with his catchy, power-chord parts. He is simple and it’s easy to learn his parts through ear but that’s one of the main reasons he’s quite good at what he does. He usually helps the chorus flow but simply letting chords ring out (if you hear one of the songs, you’d get what I mean). Ron uses quite a lot of basic punk beats and uses fast fills. An overall high-quality player but he doesn’t really play shrill and that makes the snare suffer at points. Greg is a sweet bass player and he is usually quite loud in the mix. He frequently goes into a state of backing up the guitar, it usually makes everything sound better but he does use some moments to shine. From the slow build-up in
Bad Habit to the verses of Self-Esteem, there are a lot of times he gets shined.
Picking the best song out the album would be quite hard as every song is something to enjoy listening to. The album starts off with a quick introduction and quickly goes into
Nitro (Youth Energy) which is a great punk song. Dexter’s vocals are a highlight as he stretches his vocal chords and it sounds quite sweet. The song is just a quick song to start the album up; it is quite nice but not a main part of the album. It’s hard to pick out why The Offspring are so great other than they sound good. The catchiness, the speed of some songs and the feel of the songs come into play. It’s basically fun, fast punk rock. Those of you listening to Pretty Fly and moving on to this would probably be surprised as this is the Offspring before they were itching for mainstream success. This was before The Offspring were constantly talked about in school; this is fast punk which isn’t supposed to be super special but fulfils a craving that only this band can get rid of. Dexter is not exactly a master of words but they provide some interesting parts (the line, “something’s odd, feel like I’m god, you stupid dumb-sh*t godda*n mother*cker!” was a particularly interesting line that stood out) The most important thing is that the lyrics have a meaning behind them.
I have a few favourites off the album but everything is something fun and interesting to me.
Gotta Get Away is a departure from the fast punk that is supplied throughout the album; otherwise this is a slow tempo song but not a ballad or anything, more of a rock song to me. It has my nomination for the catchiest chorus ever when Dexter spurts out the words, “Sitting on the bed, or lying wide awake. There’s demons in my head and it’s more than I can take. I think I’m on a roll but I think it’s kinda weak. Saying all I know is I got to get away from me.” It adds some variety to the album since most of the album is punk. The most political song on the album is
It’ll Be A Long Time, which creates some disturbing imagery but it is true in a way. My favourite lyric is, “Back and forth the leaders sway, backing it up with guns. Super-powers flex their wings, hold the world on puppet strings. Eagles will feed while citizens bleed.” At the end of the song Smash, it just runs on and at the end of the track length, there is the main riff from Pay The Man which wouldn’t come up till 1998 on Americana (which I’d also recommend). My opinion is that this album is worth it. It is a fun record which isn’t that serious but has some fun melodies and songs. I’d figure you’d want to try some songs out first before you buy though.
. I'm about to put out an offspring review
